Electronic publishing of documents often demands more than a stack of paper in an output tray of an office printer. Typically, a plurality of duplex printed sheets are bound into finished documents by a publishing system that prints and finishes books. Currently, publishing systems perform operations such as collating, binding, folding, trimming, saddle stapling, hole drilling, etc. Such finishing operations are typically performed on all of the sheets in a book at one time, which generally requires use of high forces, powerful motors, and dangerous cutting devices. Consequently, the systems adapted to perform these functions are relatively expensive and often exceed the costs of other desktop or office printers. As such, known publishing systems are not generally well suited for use in low-cost desktop book making.
In particular, the plurality of sheets bound in a book are typically trimmed along a fore edge opposite the book spine or binding to achieve a finished and flush edge to the book. The flush edge is believed to provide a book that is relatively easy to flip through and manipulate as well as to provide a more aesthetically pleasing book. However, as discussed above, trimming is generally performed on all of the sheets in a book at one time, which increases the power, force, and general costs required for the publishing system.
In some instances, these requirements have been lessened by utilizing a sheetwise trimming device configured to individually trim each sheet within the book. Although such a method may decrease the force and power requirements, these methods often require additional computations to be made by the system which increase the time needed to trim the sheets of the book. Accordingly, there is a need for electronic desktop publishing machines that are compact, low cost, timely, and suitable for use with office printers and for methods associated therewith.